


small magic, inconsequential in the grand scheme of things

by movfic



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Drabble, Fix-It, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Period Typical Bigotry, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, The Turtle CAN Help Us (IT)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-03-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:21:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23151625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/movfic/pseuds/movfic
Summary: (but not unlike creating a universe again, the turtle thinks, recalling richies choked sobs)
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 8
Kudos: 54





	small magic, inconsequential in the grand scheme of things

**Author's Note:**

> so ive never really written fic before but sometimes i enter a fugue state and spew a bunch of shit onto google keep notes. its not too long but i hope you enjoy it!!

words have power in derry. the lucky seven know that.

the things people say about beverly behind her back ( _shes dirty, shes playing around with all those boys again, oh what could they all be getting up to?_ ) and the whispers in her ear when she gets home ( _bevvie, bevvie, my little girl-_ ) make her feel so small sometimes, so beaten down. whether at a distance or up close, their voices all swirl around together in her mind (like the smoke from her cigs, like her january embers hair, like those spinning lights in the nightmares she doesn’t remember, like the blood that swirls down the drain from where her fathers head is bashed against the bathroom tiles-)

theres graffiti on the synagogue wall, a scar of nasty words and symbols on the face of the building for everyone to see (teethmarks, stan thinks, a bite of feral malice). stans mouth becomes a hard line and hes awash with a sense of shame that is, upon seeing his fathers furrowed brow and fastidious hands scrubbing the black paint off the brick, replaced with a quiet disbelief. his fathers stern voice tells him to go back inside. _robins. gray egrets. loons, fucking loons._ he leaves and his hands do not shake even as his nails dig into his palms (he has always been a patient boy)

wills voice, low and slow but shot with pain, a thin sickly hand clutching his. _(is this story gonna give you nightmares, mikey?_ ) he now knows what his father saw: a yellow bird, a phoenix, flying —no, floating— out of that fatal dixieland inferno. and in the years that follow, mike thinks about that bird and its life and death and life and death and life and death- and all the destruction the cycle brings. (he had opened his mouth to lie but thought better of it) ( _i guess so_ )

and more: _you fat piece of shit, friendless fucking loser; richie tozier sucks flamer cock!; are you trying to say my son is crazy? hes delicate. my son is delicate_.

(and what power do you have, billy? cant even get your wuh- wuh- words out, huh? but you told georgie that lie pretty easy, didnt you?)

well, yes.

words have power. they know that.

— 

richie likes to start his sets with a bit of audience interaction, some call and response before the ball gets rolling.

when he sees the losers again for the first time, he blanks just like he did on that stage hours ago. his hands shake. its all rushing back to him and he feels weak at the knees, at his stomach. so he puts on a performance, a front, a _good_ fucking show. even though he knows that despite 27 years of separation, they can see right through his act.

he laughs loud and gets drunk and does a little dance. he nominates eddie as a barbecue sacrifice and words are power and richie did the call so fate responds by impaling him through the chest, skewered and served up hot. in the cold and damp of the cistern eddies blood steams on richies skin and richie thinks that he will never be warm again because his heart is broken and he wants to die here. he wants to die here with him.

— 

but. (and with stories like this, theres always a but.)

even words unspoken, words that itch to see the light, to claw their way out of a throat and be heard have a bit of _something_ in them.

richie never says them because he thinks (even with eddie trapped in the refuse of that collapsed house, that unmarked grave of a house) if he says something, he’ll ruin it all. itll be out there and real and it’ll be that much worse somehow. not just mourning his friend but mourning the potential of him, of them.

(richie remembers being 16 and huddled close against eddie, nursing their matching black eyes, promising that they would leave together someday, that they’d get the fuck out of derry and never look back. he remembers eddies determined nod, even through his tears. richie seethes at that memory, _fuck pennywise for taking that away from him, for taking eddie from him. they could have been something together, maybe, they could have had something-_ )

he sees the look in bevs eyes, the soft sympathetic touch of bens hands around his shoulder, they know. they know and it makes him feel pathetic and miserable and seen.

— 

he carves his love deep into the old wooden bridge and the bridge knows too. and so does the little turtle slipsliding around in the water below. the years of hopeful, desperate love carved into that bridge are its own kind of magic. the turtle reaches out with its little flat foot and, with as much of an apology as it can muster, intertwines it with its own power. _small magic_ , inconsequential in the grand scheme of things ( _but not unlike creating a universe again_ , the turtle thinks, recalling richies choked sobs)

richie turns from his carving when he hears splashes below, leans over the creaking wood and looks down into the shallow waters of the kenduskeag. a flash of grey, of inky hair and suddenly, two bodies emerge from the stream, gasping for breath and scrabbling to get out of the water: eddie, pale and trembling, frantically looking around; stanley (and its so clearly stanley with those curls, those dark eyes) naked as the day he was born, clutching his wrists. their wounds bleed, but its sluggish, a barely there bloom of red on their skin and clothes.

richie doesn’t hesitate jumping down the embankment and into the shallow water, doesn’t consider that this might be another trick. he holds them tight and presses his lips to their heads and cries (like the day he met them, five years old, skinned knees on a playground) and says hes sorry, says he loves them

( _we love you too richie but im Naked. that turtle couldnt manifest some clothes for me? what the fuck._

 _god god rich richie please jesus christ richie_. with trembling hands, eddie tucks himself into richie, his stab wound hot against his neck. eddies blood steams and richie was wrong, its the _loveliest_ feeling.

richie is wrong again, a moment later, when he feels eddie press his lips against his.)

**Author's Note:**

> georgie and adrian pop out of the water too but i couldnt think of how to fit it into the fic lmao  
> follow me on tumblr at [movbeam](https://movbeam.tumblr.com)


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